Civil rights activist, labor leader to speak at Rice

Civil rights activist, labor leader to speak at Rice
Dolores Huerta will deliver message of peace and progress

BY JESSICA STARK
Rice News Staff

Civil rights activist Dolores Huerta will present her message of peace and progress to Rice University and the community at noon Feb. 6 in Duncan Hall’s McMurtry Auditorium. The event is open to the public.

Huerta is a respected labor leader who served a key role in organizing farm workers and later co-founded the United Farm Workers (UFW).

DOLORES HUERTA

“We are excited to welcome Dolores Huerta to our campus,” said José Aranda, chair of Hispanic Studies at Rice. “It’s an opportunity of a lifetime for our students and community members to meet one of the most influential and charismatic leaders in the civil rights movement for workers and minorities.”

Aranda teaches an English course that focuses on the origins and evolution of the Chicano/a Movement, in which Huerta played a key role by fighting for the rights of farm workers and championing the civil rights of Mexican-Americans in housing, education and political representation. Huerta was also among the first who advocated publicly and in practice against the patriarchal and sexist restrictions of her generation.

Huerta’s appearance is sponsored by Rice’s Américas Research Center, the Hispanic Studies Department, the English Department, the School of Humanities and Multicultural Community Relations in the Office of Public Affairs.

Born in New Mexico and raised in California, Huerta became a lobbyist in Sacramento, Calif., when she was 25. In that role, she succeeded in obtaining the removal of citizenship requirements from pension and public assistance programs, and passing legislation to allow citizens the right to vote in Spanish and to take the driver’s license examination in their native language.

In working with the Stockton chapter of the Community Service Organization, Huerta continued to advocate for workers and minority rights. She and Cesar Chavez formed the National Farm Workers Association, the predecessor to the UFW, which voted to join the “Delano Grape Strike.”

Huerta’s efforts led to the creation of a farm workers committee that negotiated a collective bargaining agreement with an agricultural corporation. This was the first time in U.S. history that such a committee was formed.

Later, she played an important role in creating workers’ contracts that established the first medical and pension benefits for farm workers. In 1985 she lobbied against federal guest worker programs and spearheaded legislation granting amnesty for farm workers who had lived, worked and paid taxes in the U.S. for many years. This resulted in the Immigration Act of 1985, which granted amnesty to 1.4 million farm workers.

Huerta worked with Chavez for more than 30 years until his death in 1993. Together they founded the first medical and pension plans and credit union in history for farm workers. They also formed the National Farm Workers Service Center, which today provides affordable housing and educational radio.        

In 2002, Dolores was the second recipient of the Puffin Foundation/Nation Institute Award for Creative Citizenship, which included a $100,000 grant that she used to establish her longtime dream, the Dolores Huerta Foundation’s Organizing Institute.

The foundation focuses on community organizing and leadership training in low-income, underrepresented communities.